Tuesday, May 25, 2010

The Wisdom of Peevie

I hate my mornings.  Forcing myself out of bed always feels like an insult to my body, no matter how much sleep I've had the night before.  And then getting the younger Peevies ready for school often feels like a battle for which I am unprepared and destined to lose.

M. Peevie can make a two-minute morning routine take half an hour.  Even though she's only nine, she loves the mirror, and she won't leave the bathroom until her hair looks exactly the way she wants it to look: side ponytail, bangs hanging over one eye, tendrils perfectly waved.  I don't know where she gets this from.  Certainly not from her mother:  there have been times when I've gone through half my morning before I realize that I totally forgot to brush my hair.  I'm not proud of this; it's just the way it is. 

Also, M. Peevie has no sense of urgency, until after we're already late getting out the door.  Then there are tears and regrets and promises to do better next time.

"I hate promises," I tell her, as I tell all my kids.  "Promises mean nothing to me.  You know what means something?  Doing it means something."

But some mornings contain moments of grace, and even humor.  Today, for example, I was trying to motivate M. Peevie to get up off her butt and get moving. "Wait," she said.

"There is no 'wait'," I paraphrased the Jedi Master, "There is only 'do'."

She looked at me thoughtfully for a moment.  "Shakespeare?" she said, guessing at the source of my wisdom.

"No, darling," I said. "Yoda."

"Oh," she said.  "My next guess was going to be Jesus."

4 comments:

jkww said...

LOVE this! and love that she even thought of Shakespeare first :) yoda, shakespeare, Jesus. the only great sage i would add is bono.

Anna D. said...

...Yogi Bera?

but seriously, you are not selling the whole having kids idea, now that you've revealed that HAVING them does not morph you from a morning-hater to a morning-lover. because I am SO not a morning-lover.

Unknown said...

@J--I do not know if Bono can compete in the wisdom dept. Coolness department, maybe. But wisdom?

@Anna--not being a morning person is one of the hardest parts of parenting. And I don't think anyone should have kids unless they cannot imagine their life without them. Otherwise, it's just too much work.

Anonymous said...

love this story, E.Peevsters. I am as fond of "i'm not proud of this; it's just the way it is" as the ending, because I can hear it all like you're right in front of me, and I'm laughing right now. mwah!

M-love